Davies & Robson helps staff drive out supply chain costs

Logistics consultancy, Davies & Robson has launched a new course to help companies boost their bottom lines by training sales and account management staff to avoid adding complexity and cost to the supply chain.
 
With distribution costs representing a significant proportion of the available gross margin, reduced costs automatically result in increased net profits. However, according to Davies & Robson, in many cases, sales people and account managers are committing to services which incur unnecessary logistics costs.
 
Brian Templar, Chairman, Davies & Robson says:  Whilst delighting the end customer is clearly crucial, sales staff must consider the cost of the promises they make in order to secure additional business.
 
For example, offering fast delivery lead times when these are not really required by the customer is extremely costly and unlikely to be a major factor in that customers purchasing decision.
 
On the other hand, there are sales tactics which will naturally minimise supply chain costs, for example, concentrating sales in particular areas and encouraging named day deliveries to greenfield areas in order to maximise drop density and reduce delivery costs.
 
The two-day course is designed to help companies explore how their supply chains operate and what actions the sales team can take to minimise costs without detriment to the customer experience.
 
By better understanding the cost to serve a customer, companies can also  incentivise and reward those customers who migrate to lower cost service models, in itself a powerful sales and customer retention tool.
 
At the end of the programme, delegates are tasked with devising a six-point action plan for implementation within their organisation.
 
Brian concludes: This may be as simple as making sure that customers use correct product codes to avoid administration costs and unnecessary returns or arranging for customers to go online for tracking information and PODs in order to avoid administration costs.
 
However, in the current economic climate, ensuring that sales staff understand how to squeeze maximum profit from every penny of sales revenue is imperative.
 
For further information, please contact Davies & Robson on 01327 349090 or e-mail info@daviesrobson.co.uk